Interesting stuff - I would have thought if communications/semantics could
sorted out for legal systems then anything is possible!
Anyhow, your mention of the mini-service technologies (Jini etc) struck a
chord with me. I've been wandering around this area myself, and have come to
the conclusion that probably the easiest approach, going with the flow of
recent developments, is to move everything possible from the inference
engine/agent side of things into the metadata area. The immediate benefit is
that the engines/agents themselves can be more generic, their context being
taken from the metadata on which they operate. The particular implementation
of the advertising/discovery mechanisms becomes irrelevant - anything that
can play metadata can join in. If a reasonable amount of metadata can be
extracted/generated/written about an agent, then the first stages of
negotiation between one agent and another are nothing more than a
pattern-matching excercise between two sets of metadata, needing little more
sophistication than e.g. LDAP style directory services. The benefits go
further - by abstracting out the description of the agent, it pulls it
across into the same domain as other data or active entities (reifies?) so
that the agent itself because just another thing that can be reasoned about.
<- So here goes for my theoretical XML protocol ‘Chinwag’ the purpose of
<- Chinwag is to allow two bodies to have a discourse to ascertain there
<- relevance and have no need of any formal industry specific XML structure.
Relating this to your description of Chinwag, finding the coarse-grained
compatibility/relevance of the two bodies is trivial, as metadata about each
will be available. There is the formality of having a common metadata
format, but I think some common language would be necessary in any case. The
coarse-grained matching comes cheap, and less resources are needed to check
relevance and initiate discourse at a more domain-specific level.
I've recently put this idea forward in the form of a practical proposal for
profiling processes (including agents) but it looks like this idea is going
to languish in the wilderness, and the hole be filled in a different fashion
(perhaps with a less-appropriately shaped peg). Who cares? - we'll get the
Semantic Web and its descendents before long, one way or another.
---
Danny Ayers
http://www.isacat.net
<- -----Original Message-----
<- From: www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org
<- [mailto:www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org]On Behalf Of Stuart Naylor
<- Sent: 13 April 2001 17:04
<- To: www-rdf-interest@w3.org
<- Subject: Zen & Chinwag
<-
<-
<- (This was for LegalXML.Org but please comment)
<-
<- There seems to be quite a lot of movement in RPC calls for
<- devices. I posted
<- quite a lot of bumf to the discussion forum Keywords: - Jini, UDDI, SOAP,
<- UPnP and their surrounding technologies.
<- Which even if you don’t agree with what I am about to say they are will
<- worth a look in the context of LegalXML.
<- Also there seems to be a lot of postings about TBL's Semantic Web AKA Net
<- Gods tenth commandment. The web was there to some extent before TBL and I
<- prefer to think of him as the gardener rather than the creator. This is
<- because the web has this strange but almost organic growth to
<- it. I see the
<- Semantic web as a great prophesy to provide the next generation
<- of the web
<- as a huge monolithic open knowledge service. It tackles the web
<- as a whole
<- as opposed to many of the above technologies, which make it a
<- collection of
<- many mini services. I also think that he is correct but like so
<- many of the
<- devout they can take things out of context.
<- The Semantic web will be a revolution to creating a huge open knowledge
<- store with the emphasis on open. In the context of Legal though
<- I would say
<- without trying to offend anyone this is not the case.
<- Intellectual property
<- rights and the whole concept of legal jargon, precedents and so on places
<- two legal bodies always in the position where any exchange is the minimum
<- legal requirement to satisfy both parties. As you will tell I
<- have no legal
<- experience what so ever but I would so the interchange of legal
<- information
<- is anything but Semantic and Open. May be someone would like to
<- quantify how
<- wrong I am there, but anyway. What I believe is that business
<- information is
<- not Semantic at least not until we have been paid for it.
<- I started knocking TBL on purpose because I am now going to have
<- a go at the
<- very idea of LegalXML in its present form. Please bear in mind that these
<- statements are purely to form a discussion and without a doubt
<- TBL does have
<- green fingers just like the work that has been undertaken by
<- LegalXML.org.
<- There seems to be a presumption that a given Legal scenario for example a
<- court filing will be able to be expressed in a defined
<- structure. That Legal
<- XML will lay down the protocol law and as long as we adhere we will reach
<- communication Nirvana. This provides problems with the freedom
<- of speech of
<- applications where an application may find a better method of
<- expression but
<- have no method of translation.
<- I don’t want to try and express the meaning of life but I am
<- quite prepared
<- to say I had a good day. Like that sentence we need systems that
<- can provide
<- a decomposition of an entity into what we are prepared to exchange.
<-
<- What would be interesting is not only at a B2B scenario that applications
<- themselves would interact just as we do. It’s our first day and
<- we get the
<- instructions there is the accounts dept, photocopier, your desk,
<- tea break
<- at 10.30, goodbye.
<-
<- In one of my previous emails about John McClure’s
<- http://www.dataconsortium.org/namespace/DCD100.xml I stated I couldnât
<- understand it’s use, but I have seen the light.
<-
<- So here goes for my theoretical XML protocol ‘Chinwag’ the purpose of
<- Chinwag is to allow two bodies to have a discourse to ascertain there
<- relevance and have no need of any formal industry specific XML structure.
<-
<- When we give two applications there first day at work they need to how
<- relevant they are and how they will communicate so the only formal
<- constructs of Chinwag are WHORU, IAM, and THISISME.
<-
<- The legal case management app and accounts app are introduced a
<- polite pause
<- and the legal case management app goes first ‘WHORU’.
<-
<- ‘IAM’ financial [parents: #Legal, #App Vendor Semantic] GL, Billings…
<- ‘IAM’ cms [parents: #Legal, #App Vendor Semantic] Client, Case, PIM…
<-
<- John and http://www.dataconsortium.org/namespace/DCD100.xml I now see as
<- very important because of the following: -
<-
<- possession [parents: #Right , #Legal ] The holding, control, or
<- custody of
<- property for one's own use, either as the owner or person with another
<- right.
<- possession [parents: #Poltergeist, #Supernatural] The holding,
<- control, or
<- custody of one, either as the owner or person without right.
<-
<- Pure example stuff but this is where TBL’s Semantics comes in where it is
<- the web itself as like the DNS (Domain Name System) the hops or metrics
<- between those two means the application can deduce that maybe,
<- similar but
<- your coming from Alaska on that one.
<-
<- The next conversation is ‘THISISME’ at this point a full API call list is
<- presented with the XML fragment that represents the return data
<- but the most
<- important is a by element reference to its own application definition.
<- Through the context of Semantics and the approximation of definitions a
<- protocol can be deduced without the need of formal schema declaration.
<-
<- I am working on ‘Chinwag’ at this moment the actual protocol is
<- very simple
<- but it is the AI required for a demonstration. So far I have dissected a
<- ‘Chess’ AI engine because I am trying to enable the functionality for
<- scenario’s where a single API call will not satisfy a transaction but a
<- series of calls (moves in my case) will.
<-
<- So it’s Pawns away for me at the moment but I think John McClure’s
<- DCD100.xml is a very interesting proposition but instead of
<- describing human
<- Legal keywords provide context, taxonomy of the components of legal
<- entities. I believe LegalXML should be defining the elements in
<- context but
<- not the structure.
<-
<- I know the meaning of life it’s 42, the problem is what is the question.
<-